One of the programs I spend a lot of my time working on is our sailing outreach programSharing the Seas: Safe Boating for Sailors and Whales. The overarching goal of this program is to empower sailors to use safe boating practices to reduce disturbances and injury to whales, as well as to their sailin

Life as a small whale or dolphin can be precarious at the best of times, but off the coast of Japan they face a sinister threat – the fishermen of Taiji. If they’re caught up in the maelstrom of one of the infamous ‘drive hunts’ the outcome is unlikely to be a good one.

We are in a time when the attacks on environmental protection laws in this country are at an unprecedented high. Efforts by Congress and the Trump Administration to roll back environmental and safety regulations are non-stop, extensive, and extremely harmful to the ecosystems that depend on those protections. The Marine Mammal Protection Act (MMPA) has not escaped as a targ

Last week, WDC took part in a two day workshop to help shape a “UK Dolphin and Porpoise Conservation Strategy”. We hope the strategy, once finalised will help to protect these species from bycatch, disturbance, pollution, noise and other pressures, individually as well as collectively.

As part of WDC’s work to recover the critically endangered Southern Resident orcas and their main source of food – Chinook salmon, we support efforts to restore rivers and marine ecosystems on the West Coast. Rivers from Canada to California are home to the west’s famous salmon runs, and over 130 species in the reg

Ron Macdonald retired from Scottish Natural Heritage (SNH) after 27 years of service. SNH is the public body that advises the Scottish government on wildlife and environment. A biologist by profession, he says that his interest in the humpback whale is as much spiritual as ecological.

Would you believe that more than 550 dolphins are held captive in 68 facilities across Mexico and the Caribbean? These dolphins are imprisoned primarily to amuse cruise ship passengers on ‘shore excursions’. Every day, hundreds of tourists disembark the cruise ships and pour into dolphin theme parks to hug, kiss and swim with the captive dolphins.